Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
Game maps can also have a life cycle: Start Map-Use Map-Change/Restart Map and
so on. An undesirable function—the automixing of teams—takes place as a result of
the map restart. Therefore, this defect is triggered by that Restart.
“When playing a Disintegration match in MultiMatch, the reload delay for the
sniper rifle is now shorter.�?
Yet another “life cycle�? reveals itself here. The cycle of shooting a weapon: a round of
ammunition is ready to be fired, shoot weapon, wait for shooting effects to occur
(shooting sound, projectile launched, cartridge ejected, ammo count decreased, and
so on). Then the next round is ready, and so on. The problem is noticed (“triggered�?)
when the player tries to shoot the weapon but the gun is spending too much time in
the “ammunition is ready to be fired�? part of the sequence. Think of the “loading�? key-
word and map this to the Startup trigger.
“The server will now inform the player if they vote to switch to a map that
doesn't exist on the server.�?
This is a case where the player is referencing an “unavailable�? resource by making a
request that the game can't comply with. Apparently it was permitted prior to the
patch without notifying the player that she was throwing away her vote. This is an
Exception trigger defect.
“The point of view for demo recording will now follow the direction in which
the player is looking.�?
Don't confuse a game “mode�? with “configuration.�? Think of a mode as another fea-
ture or function of the game. Even though this bug only had to be fixed for demo
recording, the problem was in the In-Game operating region and not dependent on
any configuration or condition. It is another Normal trigger defect.
Sometimes you will come across defects that may seem to belong to more than one
trigger category. An example might be the case where an exception is not handled
properly during startup. What you must resolve is which situation was mostly respon-
sible for triggering the defect. If the situation is only considered an “exception�? during
startup, then it is the exception that is triggering the fault. The rationale is that there
is a particular piece of code that should exist to handle the exception during startup.
The exception condition causes that code to execute and finds that it is missing or
faulty. On the other hand, if the handling of that exception is common throughout the
game and it only fails to operate properly during startup, then it is the fact that you
tried it at startup that triggered the exception code not to run or to run improperly.
Your responsibility as a tester is to test the handling of this exception in all operating
regions of the game to help make this kind of determination.
